How to take baby milestone photos with an iPhone

Put the baby on a plain blanket beside a window, hold the phone flat above them, tap the face to set exposure, and hold the shutter for a burst. Six or seven seconds of actual work. The steps below are the ones that make the difference between a snapshot and a photo you would print.

A hand holding a phone above a cream blanket beside a window, framing a flat lay of a muslin wrap, a wooden rattle and knitted booties

Take a baby milestone photo with an iPhone

1Find the light. Set up beside a window, not in front of it and not under a ceiling light. Turn the ceiling light off: mixing daylight with a warm bulb is what makes home photos look orange in patches.
2Clear the background. Move the laundry basket. A plain blanket with nothing else in frame is what makes a phone photo read as intentional.
3Get above the baby. Lay the baby on their back and hold the phone flat, parallel to the floor, roughly 70cm up. Straight-down framing is forgiving of every age and keeps month one and month twelve comparable.
4Tap the face, then shoot a burst. Tap your baby's face on screen to set focus and exposure, then hold the shutter button and slide left for a burst. Keep one frame out of twenty.
5Add the age and the memory. Put the month number and one line about what changed on the photo while you still remember it. A week later you will not.
6Put it somewhere you will see it. A milestone photo buried in a camera roll of 12,000 pictures is a photo you have effectively lost. Export it, or set it as a Home Screen widget.

Light first, everything else second

Phone cameras have small sensors, so they are more sensitive than a real camera to where the light comes from. A baby lit by a window from the side has shape and skin tone. The same baby lit by the kitchen ceiling has grey shadows under the eyes and a yellow cast that no filter fully removes.

Overcast days are the best days. A bright white sky is a softbox the size of a house, and it arrives free. On a sunny day, move back from the window until the hard edge of the sunbeam is no longer on the blanket.

Framing that works at every age

Overhead is the framing to default to. A newborn cannot hold a pose, a six-month-old tips over, a nine-month-old crawls out of frame. Flat on their back, photographed from above, all of them stay where you put them.

Leave space around the baby rather than filling the frame. You will crop later for a square post, a story, or a print, and each of those wants a different shape. Space now is options later.

Turn the grid on in Settings, Camera, Grid. Lining the phone up with the blanket edges keeps the set from drifting a few degrees off-square each month.

Little's export sheet over a milestone photo, with Square, Story and Print options and Save to Photos and Share buttons — One photo, three shapes. Exporting for a square post, a story and print separately beats cropping the same file three times.

The part people skip

Write down what changed. Rolled over, found her feet, first time she laughed at the dog. The photo records what your baby looked like in August, and one sentence records who they were, which is the part memory loses first.

Do it in the app instead

Little keeps the photo, the age badge and the line you wrote together as one mat, then hands you the export in the size you need. Free on the App Store, iPhone only.

Editing without overdoing it

Raise exposure slightly, pull the warmth down if the room was yellow, and stop. Baby skin goes waxy fast under smoothing and clarity, and the result dates in a way the unedited photo never does.

Portrait mode is worth using only when there is a background you cannot move. On a plain blanket it has nothing to blur and sometimes clips a foot.

Questions parents ask

Should I use Portrait mode for baby photos?

Rarely. Portrait mode blurs behind the subject, which helps in a busy room and does nothing on a plain blanket. It also struggles with fine hair and can shave a soft edge off an ear or a foot.

What time of day is best for baby milestone photos?

Mid-morning, when the light is bright but no longer coming in at a low angle, and when most babies are awake and content. Pick the slot after the first nap and use the same one every month.